英語長文読解問題　金利（利子）の歴史

以下の英文は、金利（利子）の歴史を紹介したWikipedia英語版のページを抜粋したものである。英文を読み、以下の問いに答えよ。
※世界史というよりは、経済学部志望者には理解してもらいたい内容である。

問1：最初に使用された金融（信用）の実例は、シュメール人の文書によると何であると考えられるか？
問2：325年のニケーア公会議では、どのようなことが決定されたか？
問3：ルネサンス時代には、どのような変化がみられたか？

Credit is thought to have preceded the existence of coinage by several thousands of years. The first recorded instance of credit is a collection of old Sumerian documents from 3000 BC that show systematic use of credit to loan both grain and metals. The rise of interest as a concept is unknown, though its use in Sumeria argue that it was well established as a concept by 3000BC if not earlier, with historians believing that the concept in its modern sense may have arisen from the lease of animal or seeds for productive purposes. The argument that acquired seeds and animals could reproduce themselves was used to justify interest, but ancient Jewish religious prohibitions against usury  represented a "different view".

The first written evidence of compound interest dates roughly 2400 BC. The annual interest rate was roughly 20%. Compound interest was necessary for the development of agriculture and important for urbanization.

While the traditional Middle Eastern views on interest were the result of the urbanized, economically developed character of the societies that produced them, the new Jewish prohibition on interest showed a pastoral, tribal influence. In the early 2nd millennium BC, since silver used in exchange for livestock or grain could not multiply of its own, the Laws of Eshnunna instituted a legal interest rate, specifically on deposits of dowry. Early Muslims called this riba, translated today as the charging of interest.

The First Council of Nicaea, in 325, forbade clergy from engaging in usury which was defined as lending on interest above 1 percent per month (12.7% AER). Ninth-century ecumenical councils applied this regulation to the laity. Catholic Church opposition to interest hardened in the era of the Scholastics, when even defending it was considered a heresy. St. Thomas Aquinas, the leading theologian of the Catholic Church, argued that the charging of interest is wrong because it amounts to "double charging", charging for both the thing and the use of the thing.

In the medieval economy, loans were entirely a consequence of necessity (bad harvests, fire in a workplace) and, under those conditions, it was considered morally reproachable to charge interest. It was also considered morally dubious, since no goods were produced through the lending of money, and thus it should not be compensated, unlike other activities with direct physical output such as blacksmithing or farming. For the same reason, interest has often been looked down upon in Islamic civilization, with almost all scholars agreeing that the Qur'an explicitly forbids charging interest.

Medieval jurists developed several financial instruments to encourage responsible lending and circumvent prohibitions on usury, such as the Contractum trinius.

In the Renaissance era, greater mobility of people facilitated an increase in commerce and the appearance of appropriate conditions for entrepreneurs to start new, lucrative businesses. Given that borrowed money was no longer strictly for consumption but for production as well, interest was no longer viewed in the same manner.

The first attempt to control interest rates through manipulation of the money supply was made by the Banque de France in 1847.

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解答：

問1：最初に使用された利子の実例は、シュメール人の文書によると何であると考えられるか？

シュメールの文書には、紀元前3000年頃の古いものがあり、穀物や金属の貸付において、利子を利用していたという記録が残っています。

問2：325年のニケーア公会議では、どのようなことが決定されたか？

325年のニケーア公会議では、聖職者の利子取りを禁止しました。利子としての利息が1か月あたり1パーセント以上（年率12.7%）の利子を取ることを禁止しました。これは、9世紀の教会会議で信徒にも同様の規制が適用されました。このキリスト教の立場は、後にスコラ学者の時代に強固なものとなりました。

問3：ルネサンス時代には、どのような変化がみられたか？

ルネサンス時代には、人々の移動が活発化し、商業が増加し、新しい、利益の出る事業を始めるための適切な条件が整いました。借りたお金が消費だけでなく生産のために使われるようになったため、利子は以前とは異なる視点で見られるようになりました。